Introducing SEC data guy. H/she mines the universe of XBRL-formatted filings in order to represent um aggregate claims of financial performance ...
[June] The problem for XBRL advocates is that "transparency" cuts a number of ways. Is XBRL better than the current publicly available data scraped from HTML filings? Sure. But it's hard to research the current problems. XBRL is easy. I can check XBRL data for technical errors in about a minute (download the data, zip it, upload it to a publicly available validation tool, see results).
regardless of a company's characteristics or industry (NIC) assignment...
[July] Below is a graph that shows the total number of distinct entities filing a 10-K or 10-Q over time. It also shows the number of distinct entities expressing "substantial doubt" for the first time in one of those filings (full details on the data below the jump).
so far. Useful, no? Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.
While Friday marked the first day of the new G.M., many unanswered questions remain. ... He also said that the government's involvement at G.M. would change immediately from day-to-day supervision to a more hands-off attitude, but as the company's biggest shareholder, the Treasury's role is far from over. ... G.M.'s new chairman, Edward E. ["I don't know anything about cars"] Whitacre Jr., in his first public comments since joining the carmaker, said he agreed to join G.M. because he had "always admired this company. "Mr. Whitacre, the former chairman and chief executive of AT&T, said [NEW!]G.M. had the "fundamentals" to succeed, having shed the debt that was weighing it down.... G.M. and the government completed the legal paperwork needed to put the company's most desirable assets, including brands like Chevrolet, Cadillac and GMC, into the new company -- now named the Vehicle Acquisition Company but soon to be renamed the General Motors Company. The federal government will hold nearly 61 percent of the new company, with the Canadian government, a health care trust [VEBA] for the United Auto Workers union and bondholders owning the balance.... Senior administration officials have promised that they will not "micromanage" the company, despite being the majority owner and having already picked new directors, including Mr. Whitacre. By the end of the year, the government will have poured $50 billion of taxpayer money into the automaker. The administration hopes to take the new G.M. public again next year.
He also said that the government's involvement at G.M. would change immediately from day-to-day supervision to a more hands-off attitude, but as the company's biggest shareholder, the Treasury's role is far from over. ...
G.M.'s new chairman, Edward E. ["I don't know anything about cars"] Whitacre Jr., in his first public comments since joining the carmaker, said he agreed to join G.M. because he had "always admired this company. "Mr. Whitacre, the former chairman and chief executive of AT&T, said [NEW!]G.M. had the "fundamentals" to succeed, having shed the debt that was weighing it down....
G.M. and the government completed the legal paperwork needed to put the company's most desirable assets, including brands like Chevrolet, Cadillac and GMC, into the new company -- now named the Vehicle Acquisition Company but soon to be renamed the General Motors Company. The federal government will hold nearly 61 percent of the new company, with the Canadian government, a health care trust [VEBA] for the United Auto Workers union and bondholders owning the balance....
Senior administration officials have promised that they will not "micromanage" the company, despite being the majority owner and having already picked new directors, including Mr. Whitacre. By the end of the year, the government will have poured $50 billion of taxpayer money into the automaker.
The administration hopes to take the new G.M. public again next year.
NOTE: The lede has been edited since CR posted at 08:53 EST to read,
"The carmaker General Motors began a new era for itself Friday, with its chief executive pronouncing the end of "business as usual" and promising to focus on its customers and vehicles more than ever before."
It had been, "General Motors completed a major step in its turnaround on Friday and closed the sale of its good assets to a new, government-backed carmaker,"
reminding me how many times AIG needed to correct the facts of its 8Ks last year, reporting transactions with federal agencies. I wonder if SEC data guy operates a version tracker... Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.
